Director Shami Chakrabarti: "The Tory experiment in appointing non-lawyers as Lord Chancellor has so far seen the destruction of legal aid and is now aimed at the Human Rights Act.

"Mr Gove will have a hard time persuading Britain's senior judges he respects the Rule of Law."

There are also fears from human rights group Reprieve.

Director Clare Algar said: "We hope that Mr Gove ignores the myths and spin that many others have used against human rights legislation, and considers instead the important central principles.

"This is something which helps defend the weak from the strong, and the individual citizen from the abuses of Government.

"Recent governments of all stripes have done too much to weaken the ability of ordinary people to hold their political masters to account.

"We hope that the new Justice Secretary does not continue down this dangerous route."

The Conservative manifesto says scrapping the Act will "break the formal link between British courts and the European Court of Human Rights, and make our own Supreme Court the ultimate arbiter of human rights matters in the UK".

"Some of the things that most annoy people on the immigration issue isn't the volume of immigrants, but the fact that you have a terrorist who arrives here who we don't want on our shores and we're not able to deport."